After all that bluster last week about opening up bottles and attempting to carbonate that flat first batch of ale, I made no moves toward that task whatsoever last weekend. Why? Not enough time. The nerve of even writing that…I spend ample time staring into the ether, wondering about what I should really be doing.…

By now, all of the ales and wine I put up should be drinkable, particularly the ones put up in June and July. So far, I have not tried any of the new wine since I had a case left from last year. I have tapped the ale. Two different batches. Phooey gooey, Looney Looey!…

Our church had an old-fashioned day last Sunday, when all were supposed to dress as they would have generations ago. Saturday I looked through our stuff and saw nothing really appropriate for her to wear. I had a few yards of Delft blue cotton with perched white birds all over it that I got 85% off…

I have come to the conclusion I am a person driven by one compulsion after another. Brew season, I am obsessed with sanitizing more bottles and deciding how many buckets I can manage fermenting at one time. In the Spring, I am consumed by trying such and such fruit trees yet again or having another go at…

On the long drive home to the cabin Friday evening, the trees looked more and more bare the nearer I got to the cabin. My area must have endured sudden gusts or could have been on the edge of a windy storm while I worked in exile here in the city; something made all the…

As a Sci-Fi writer, I have given excessive though over the shape, temperament and environment needs of an alien being we might meet someday. There’s no reason to not have a billion different forms of life and limb, but some attributes seem likely to be more common than others. We are more likely to cozy…